Mariah
(Minerd) White
(1833-1894+)
Mariah
(Minerd) White was born in 1833 in Wharton Twp., Fayette County, PA, the
daughter of Henry and Hester (Sisler) Minerd.
Her husband and sons made their living for many years on the National
Highway (now US Route 40) when it was a major employer and our nation's major east-west
road.
Evidence suggests that in 1854, when she was 21, Mariah may have given birth to a daughter whom she named Nancy J. Minerd.
In the late 1850s, Mariah married Perry Green White (1812-1886), a widower almost 20 years her senior. He was a native of Cumberland, Allegany County, MD, but also is said to have been born in Frederick, Frederick County, MD. (This is not yet confirmed.)
With her marriage, Mariah became an instant step-mother to Perry's seven children -- John Irving White, Mary Frances Turner, Thomas H. White, Joseph B. White, Charlotte I. Ingles and Robert Marshall White Sr. She and Perry went on to have five children of their own: Sarah 'Annie' Hopwood, George H. White, Hannah Wortman, Emily Hester Goff and possibly one other who died young.
When the Civil War broke out, three sons went off to serve -- John, Thomas and Joseph. Tragedy struck in 1863 when John died in the battle of Fort Monroe, SC. John's obituary in the Uniontown Genius of Liberty said he had left "behind an aged and loving father, and kind brothers and sisters, [who] took his departure to assist in sustaining the honor of the nation."
Sadness struck again in 1873 when son Joseph, a Civil War veteran, was "very much troubled with cough, had a severe hemorrhage of the lung and sunk rapidly after that," dying at Hopwood, leaving a wife and baby son.
In the early years of his first marriage, to Charlotte McClatchy, Perry was a farmer and resided in Wharton Twp. He also apparently worked as a tax collector at one time.
Perry's
primary employment, however, was as a contractor for construction and
maintenance of the National
Highway, (sometimes known as the Cumberland Road), America's first
federally funded interstate highway. He is named twice in the landmark 1894 book, The Old Pike:
A History of The National Road, authored by Thomas B. Searight. The title
page of the volume is seen at right.
In the book, Perry is named among a long list of men who were "contractors for work on the original construction of the road." During the period from May 1, 1843 to Dec. 31, 1844, Perry is known to have worked on the Western Division of the National Road under the supervision of William Searight, Commissioner of the Cumberland Road in Pennsylvania. He was paid $116.06 for his labors.
In 1850, Perry joined the Free and Accepted Masons of Pennsylvania as an apprentice, and has been noted in a memoir by a granddaughter as "the first Mason in Monroe (Hopwood)." He was a member of the Fayette Lodge 228 of the Masons for 40 years. His membership was suspended but later, in 1862, he was reinstated, and remained in good standing for the rest of his life. He was so proud of his affiliation with the Masons that he later had its symbol carved into his grave marker.
Continued the memoir:
Everyone knew and respected Brother White. He was a real devout Christian, belonging to the old stone Methodist church on the cemetary hill, which has been torn down for so long now. I have heard my mother (Hessie Goff) tell how when the minister called on Brother White for prayer, in the church, he would pray the 90th Psalm. He was always "ready" for the Lord.
In about 1864, after his second marriage, Perry and Mariah moved to the village of Monroe, now known as Hopwood. The booklet The National Road - Commemorative Pictorial History says that Hopwood is famed today for having "the largest number of extant colonial stone buildings of any town on the National Road."
Typical toll gate of that era
Said
the Uniontown Republican Standard, "When the late Sebastian
Rush was first appointed superintendent of the National road, about twenty-five
years since, he put [White] in charge of the Monroe gate and he continued to
hold such ever since up to the time of his death." Perry's work provided him with "general satisfaction," said the Genius of
Liberty. A portrait of Sebastian Rush is seen at left.
Perry was a church member about 50 years, mostly of the Methodist Church, and a Sunday School leader. In 1876, he served the public as auditor of South Union Twp.
In 1879, Perry and his brother in law Andrew Minerd testified on behalf of their nephew, Isaac F. Minerd, stating that they had both known Isaac before the war and that he was free of illness at that time, although his health had been badly affected during the hardships of service.
On
Jan. 22, 1886, Perry went to work at the gate as per usual. He came home at 4 p.m. and "fell into a stupor,
from which he could not be aroused, and continued in that condition until his
death" two days later, said the Uniontown Genius of Liberty. "Before becoming unconscious..., he
experienced strong and lively hopes of a glorious immortality." Another
description of his death states that after coming home and having his dinner,
"he said, 'Mother, I think I will go upstairs and rest a bit.' So, after a
while she thought he had been up there long enough, and when she went up he had
passed away in his sleep." He was laid to rest at Hopwood Cemetery.
Mariah's fate is unknown. Her last known whereabout was in September 1894, when she lived in Uniontown and her step-daughter Charlotte came to visit. It's assumed that when Mariah died, she was buried near her husband at Hopwood Cemetery, but while Perry has a grave marker, she rests anonymously.
They are mentioned in the 1912 book by John W. Jordan and James Hadden, Genealogical and Personal History of Fayette and Greene Counties.
Copyright
© 2000-2006 Mark A. Miner.
Sebastian Rush portrait originally published in The Old Pike:
A History of The National Road (Thomas B. Searight, 1894)